Small Souls/Chapter XXI
“So you’re thinking of being presented at Court next winter?” said Van Vreeswijck, who had been a chum of Henri’s at Leiden and who was now a chamberlain-extraordinary to the Queen Regent, as he and Van der Welcke were leaving the Plaats together.
Van der Welcke looked up:
“I wasn’t thinking of it for a second.”
“Really? I heard that you meant to, or rather that it was your wife’s intention.”
“I haven’t exchanged a single word on the subject with my wife.”
Van Vreeswijck took Van der Welcke’s arm: “Really? Well, to tell you the truth, I could not quite understand it.”
“Why not?” asked Van der Welcke, promptly taking offence.
“Look here, old fellow: I can speak to you frankly, can’t I, as an old friend? But, if you’re touchy . . . then we’ll avoid intimate matters.”
“Not at all: what were you going to say?”
“Nothing that you won’t see for yourself, if you think for a moment. But, if the whole question of getting presented at Court doesn’t exist with you and your wife, then don’t let me bring it up at all.” “No, no!” said Van der Welcke, becoming interested. “Don’t beat about the bush; say what you meant to say.”
“I couldn’t understand your having the idea, or how the idea could ever have occurred to your wife: I tell you so, honestly. De Staffelaer is a relation of the Eilenburgs and of the Van Heuvel Steyns; and it would surely be painful for you and your wife to meet those people, wouldn’t it? . . . That’s all.”
“Short and sweet,” said Van der Welcke, still feeling put out.
“But that’s the whole point of it.”
“You’re right,” muttered Van der Welcke, gloomily. “Perhaps we ought never to have come to the Hague.”
“Nonsense!” said Van Vreeswijck, rather feebly. “Your old friends are glad to see you back again. The question of the Court is non-existent with you both. Well, then there’s nothing to fret about. . . . As for myself, I am more than glad to see you at the Hague again,” he continued, more cheerfully, almost in a tone of relief. “I have the pleasantest memories of the occasions when I had the privilege of meeting your wife in Brussels. When would it suit you both for me to come and call?”
“Will you look round one evening? Or, if you really want to be friendly, come and dine.”
“I should like to, above all things. When shall I come?”
“Day after to-morrow, at seven.” “Delighted. Just yourselves? And I’ll call and leave a card to-morrow.”
“By the way,” said Van der Welcke. “You mentioned De Staffelaer: where is he now?”
“At his country-place, near Haarlem. He’s still flourishing. He’s well over eighty.”
“He must be.”
They parted. Van der Welcke went gloomily home. It was curious, but, every afternoon, when he went home from the Witte or the Plaats, he had that gloomy, unsettled feeling. The moment he set eyes on Addie, however, his face at once lighted up; but, this time, when the boy wanted to romp, before dinner, Van der Welcke began to think whether Constance would approve of his having asked Van Vreeswijck to dinner two days later. . . .
They sat down to table:
“By the way,” said Van der Welcke, hesitatingly, “I met Van Vreeswijck; and he wanted to call on you and asked when it would suit you.”
“He might have done so long ago,” said Constance, who had entertained Van Vreeswijck once or twice in Brussels.
“He apologized,” said Van der Welcke, in defence of his friend. “He did not know whether you were quite settled. I told him he must come and dine one night and—if it’s not too much trouble for you—I asked him to come the day after tomorrow.”
“I think he might have paid a visit first.”
“He said something about leaving a card to-morrow. But, if you don’t care about it, I’ll put him off.”
“No, it’s all right,” said Constance.
It was an instinct with her to be hospitable, to have her house always open to her friends. But, until now, she had dreaded asking any one to meals, except Gerrit and Adeline, quite quietly, and, just once, Paul.
Paul happened to call that evening.
“Do you mind if I ask Paul too?” she said to her husband.
“No, of course not; Paul is delightful.”
Paul accepted with pleasure. On the evening of the little dinner, he was the first to arrive.
“Addie is dining with Gerrit and Adeline,” she said. “It will be nicer for him.”
“How charming you’ve made your place look!” said Paul, enthusiastically.
She had a pretty little drawing-room, cosy and comfortable and gay with many flowers in vases. And she looked most charming, young, with the attractive pallor of her rounded face, the face of a woman in her prime, and a smile in the dimples about her lips, because the graciousness of a hostess was natural to her. Paul thought her the best-looking of all his sisters, as she stood before him in her black dress: a film of black mousseline-de-soie and black lace, falling in a diaphanous cloud over white taffeta. There reigned, in her rooms, in herself, the easy grace of a woman of the world, a quality which Paul had not yet observed in her, because until now he had seen her either quite intimately, in her bedroom, or at those crowded family-evenings. It was as though she had come into her own again.
Yes, as she now welcomed Van Vreeswijck, with a soft, playful word or two, Paul thought her simply adorable. He suddenly understood that, ten years ago, his sister might well have been irresistible. Even now, she had something about her so young, charming, engaging, pretty and distinguished that she was a revelation to him. She was an exquisite woman.
She had not hired a man-servant: the parlour-maid would wait. She herself drew back the hangings from the dining-room door-way and, without taking Van Vreeswijck’s arm, asked the men to come in to dinner. A pink light of shaded candles slumbered over the table, with its bunch of grapes and its pink roses and maiden-hair fern, in between the crystal and the silver.
“But this is most charming!” said Paul, to himself, for he could not tell his sister so yet, as she and Van der Welcke were talking to Van Vreeswijck. “This is most charming! A party of four, like this, in this pretty room. That’s just what I like. Compare all that formality of Bertha’s. Bertha never gives these intimate little dinners. This is just what I like at my age”—Paul was thirty-five—“no formality, but everything elegant and nicely-served and good. . . . Excellent hors d’œuvres! Constance knows how to do things! Compare the friendly, but homely rumpsteak which I sometimes get at Gerrit and Adeline’s; or Adolphine’s harum-scarum dinners. . . . No, this is as it should be: a quiet, friendly little dinner and yet everything just right. . . . Van Vreeswijck’s dinner-jacket looks very well on him; only I don’t like the cut of his waistcoat: too high, I think, his waistcoat. Those are nice buttons of his. But he’s wearing a ready-made black tie! How is it possible! Strange how you suddenly perceive an aberration like that in a man: a ready-made tie! Who on earth wears a ready-made tie nowadays! Still, he looks very well otherwise. . . . Nice soup, this velouté. . . . What a duck Constance looks! Would you ever think that she was a woman of two-and-forty! She’s like Mamma: Mamma also has that softness, that distinction, that same smile; Mamma even has those dimples still, in the corners of her mouth. . . . No, none of my other sisters could have done that, pulled back the hangings herself with that pretty gesture and asked us so naturally to come in to dinner. . . . You’ll see, Constance will make her house very cosy, even though they are not rich and though they won’t go into society officially. These friendly little dinners are just the thing. . . .”
He had to join in the conversation now, with Van Vreeswijck; and Van der Welcke, who was in a pleasant mood, let himself go in a burst of irrepressible frankness:
“Tell me, Vreeswijck, who is it that’s been saying we wanted to be presented at Court? . . .”
Van Vreeswijck hesitated, thought it a dangerous subject of conversation. But Constance laughed gently:
“Yes,” she said, seconding her husband, “there seems to be a rumour that we have that intention; and the intention never existed for a moment.”
Van Vreeswijck breathed again, relieved:
“Oh, mevrouw, how do people ever get hold of their notions? One will suggest, ‘I wonder if they mean to be presented?’ The other catches only the last words and says, ‘They mean to be presented!’ And so the story gets about.”
“I shouldn’t care for it in the least,” said Constance. “I have become so used, of late, to a quiet life that I should think it tiresome to be paying and receiving a lot of visits. I am glad to be at the Hague, because I am back among my family. . . .”
“And the family is very glad too!” said Paul, with brotherly gallantry, and raised his glass.
She thanked him with her little laugh:
“But I want nothing more than that. And I don’t think Henri cares for anything else either.”
“No, not at all!” said Van der Welcke. “Only, I can’t understand why people at once start talking about others and, without a moment’s hesitation, pretend to know more about a fellow’s plans than he himself does. I never talk about anybody!”
“I must admit,” Constance laughed, “that I often differ from my husband, but in this we are absolutely at one: I too never talk about anybody!”
“But that people should talk about us is only natural, I suppose!” said Van der Welcke and threw up his young, blue eyes, almost ingenuously. “They had forgotten us for years and now they see us again.”
“He oughtn’t to have said that,” thought Paul. “Sometimes, he is just like a young colt. . . .”
And he could understand that Constance occasionally felt peevish. These allusions, however slight, must necessarily vex her, he thought. Van der Welcke, when he let himself go, was capable of saying very tactless things. He generally restrained himself, but, when he did not, he became too spontaneous for anything. And Paul said something to Van Vreeswijck to change the conversation.
Yes, Paul felt for his sister. After all, that sort of past always remained, always clung about one. They were sitting here so cosily; Van Vreeswijck was a charming talker; and yet, at every moment, there were little rocks against which the conversation ran. Constance was behaving well, thought Paul: he had seen her quite different, flying out at the least word. But she was a woman of the world: she did not fly out before a stranger. . . . Here they were again, though: the conversation was turning on old Mr. and Mrs. van der Welcke. There they were again: he felt that Van Vreeswijck hesitated even before asking after the old people; and not until Constance herself said that she thought them both looking so well did Van Vreeswijck venture to go on talking about that father- and mother-in-law, who had sacrificed their son, who had refused for years to see their daughter-in-law and even their grandchild. . . . Surely it was better to talk about indifferent things. . . .
But this was not only one of Constance’ handsome, but also one of her amiable evenings. As a hostess, in however small a way, she came into her own and was like another woman, much more gentle, without any bitterness and ready to accept the fact that a rock had to be doubled now and again. Her smile gave to her cheeks a roundness that made her look younger. What a pity, thought Paul, that she was not always just like that, so full of tact, always the hostess in her own house, hostess to her husband too:
“How strange women are,” he thought. “If I were dining here alone with them, in the ordinary course of things, and if these same rocks had occurred in the conversation, Constance would have lost her temper three times by now and Van der Welcke would have caught it finely. And now that there’s a guest, now that we are in our dinner-jackets and Constance in an evening-frock, now that there are grapes and flowers on the table and a more elaborate menu than usual, now she does not lose her temper and won’t lose her temper, however many rocks we may have to steer past. I believe that, even if we began to talk about infidelity and divorce, about marriages with old men and love-affairs with young ones, she would remain quite calm, smiling prettily with those little dimples at the corners of her mouth, as though nothing could apply to her. . . . What strange creatures women are, full of little reserves of force that make them very powerful in life! . . . And, presently, when Van Vreeswijck is gone, she will rave at Van der Welcke if he so much as blows his nose; and all her little reserve-forces will have vanished; and she will be left without the smallest self-control. . . . Still, in any case, she is most charming; and I have had a capital dinner and am feeling very pleasant. . . .”
The bell rang and, through the open door leading to the hall, Constance and Paul heard voices at the front-door:
“That’s Adolphine’s voice!” said Constance.
“And Carolientje’s,” said Paul. . . .
“Oh, then I won’t stay!” they heard Adolphine say, loudly, shrilly.
Constance rose from her chair. She thought it a bore that Adolphine should call just in this evening, but she was bent upon never allowing Adolphine to see that she was unwelcome:
“Excuse me, Mr. van Vreeswijck, for a moment. I hear my sister. . . .”
She went out into the passage:
“How are you, Adolphine?”
“How are you, Constance?” said Adolphine.
She knew that Constance was giving a little dinner that evening and she had come prying on purpose, though she pretended to know nothing:
“I just looked in,” she said, “as I was passing with Carolientje; I saw a light in your windows and thought you must be at home. But your servant says that you’re having a dinner-party!” said Adolphine, tartly and reproachfully, as though Constance had no right to give a dinner.
“Not a dinner-party. Van Vreeswijck and Paul are dining with us.”
“Van Vreeswijck? Oh!” said Adolphine. “The one at Court?”
“He’s a chamberlain of the Regent’s,” said Constance, simply.
“Oh!”
“He’s an old friend of Van der Welcke’s,” said Constance, almost in self-excuse.
“Oh! Well, then I won’t disturb you. . . .”
The dining-room door was open. Adolphine peeped in and saw the three men talking over their dessert. She saw the candles, the flowers, the dinner-jackets of the men; she noticed Constance’ dress. . . .
“Do come in, Adolphine,” said Constance, mastering herself and in her gentlest voice.
“No, thanks. If you’re having a dinner-party, I won’t come in, at dessert. . . . Oof! How hot it is in here, Constance: do you still keep on fires? It’s suffocating in your house; and so dark, with those candles. How pale you look! Aren’t you feeling well?”
“Pale? No, I’m feeling very well indeed.”
“Oh, I thought you must be tired or ill, you look so awfully pale! You’re not looking well. Perhaps you’ve put on too much powder. Or is it your dress that makes you look pale? Is that one of your Brussels dresses? I don’t think it improves you! Your grey cashmere suits you much better.”
“Yes, Adolphine, but that’s a walking-dress.”
“Oh, of course, you can’t wear that at a dinner, at a dinner-party. Still, I prefer that walking-dress.”
“Won’t you come in for a moment?”
“No, I’m only in walking-dress, you see, Constance dear. And Carolientje too. And then I don’t want to disturb you, at your men’s dinner-party.”
“I’m sorry, Adolphine, that you should have called just this night, if you won’t come in. Come in to tea some other evening soon, will you?”
“Well, you see, I don’t often come this way: you live so far from everywhere, in this depressing Kerkhoflaan. At least, I always think it depressing. What induced you to come and live here, tell me, between two graveyards? It’s not healthy to live in, you know, because of the miasma. . . .”
“Oh, we never notice anything!”
“Ah, that’s because you always keep your windows shut! You want more ventilation, really, in Holland. I assure you, I should stifle in this atmosphere.”
“Come, Adolphine, do come in. . . .”
“No, really not. I’m going; make my apologies to your husband. Good-bye, Constance. Come, Carolientje.”
And, as though she were really suffocating, she hurried to the front-door with her daughter, first glancing through the open door of the dining-room, noticing the hot-house grapes, the pink roses, screwing up her eyes to read the label on the champagne-bottle from which Paul was filling up the glasses. Then she pushed Carolientje before her and departed, slamming the front-door after her. . . .
Constance went back to the dining-room. Her nerves were shaken, but she kept a good countenance.
“It was Adolphine, wasn’t it?” asked Paul.
“Yes, but she wouldn’t come in,” said Constance. “It’s such a pity, she’s such good company. . . .”
She did not mean it, but she wished to mean it. That she said so was not hypocrisy on her part. Any other evening, after Adolphine’s comments, all in five minutes, on her house, her street, her candles, her fires, her dress and her complexion, she would probably have flung herself at full length on her sofa, to recover from the annoyance of it. But now she was the hostess; and she showed no discomposure and asked the men not to mind her and to stay and smoke their cigars with her, at the dinner-table. She herself poured out the coffee, from her dainty little silver-gilt service, and the liqueurs; and, when Paul asked her if she would not smoke a cigarette, she answered, with her pretty expression and the little laugh at the bend of her lips which made her so young that night and caused her to look so very charming:
“No, I used to smoke, in my flighty days; but I gave it up long ago.”